Left-handed reliever Joely Rodriguez has signed with the Red Sox, the club announced Wednesday.
Rodriguez gets a one-year contract with a club option for 2024.
His 2023 salary will be $1.5 million, and he can earn an additional $500,000 based on how many games he’s active for and up to $250,000 each season based on appearances.
The club option is worth $4.25 million with a $500,000 buyout if declined and includes bonuses for appearances made.
Rodriguez is guaranteed $2 million; he can earn up to $8.25 million.
Joely Rodriguez Is a Low Risk, High Reward Signing For Red Sox
Joely Rodriguez, who underwent minor shoulder surgery at the end of the season, is, at worst, left-handed reliever depth at the MLB level for a Red Sox bullpen that desperately needs it.
Rodriguez had a 4.47 ERA over 50.1 innings for the Mets last season. He struck out 26.4 percent of batters faced and walked 12 percent.
Opponents hit .290/.361/.355/.716 against him in high leverage situations and .250/.333/.306/.639 with runners in scoring position.
But he held left-handed batters to a .233/.320/.326/.645 slash line. Rodriguez struck out 33 percent of the lefties he faced, walked 11 percent, and stranded 77.7 percent.
And if all goes well, Joely Rodriguez, sent with Joey Gallo to the Yankees in 2021, is a quality left-hander who, the Red Sox believe, can get left-handed and right-handed hitters out.
Despite an ERA in the mid-4s, the 31-year-old had a 3.23 FIP and a 3.62 expected ERA in 2022 and was almost as good vs. righties (.625 OPS) as he was against lefties.
Per Chris Cotillo of masslive.com, the Red Sox are intrigued by Joely Rodriguez’s pitch mix. And they like that he induces grounders (54.5 percent last season), weak contact (3.8 percent barrel rate/85.3 MPH average exit velocity/31.8 percent hard-hit rate), and whiffs (29.2 percent).
Rodriguez is primarily a sinker/changeup pitcher and occasionally mixes in a fastball and slider.
Opposing hitters didn’t do much damage against his sinker (92.7 MPH) last season despite a .262 average against it. Rodriguez’s sinker had over two inches more vertical and horizontal break than average.
The changeup (87.8 MPH) is his best pitch. Opposing batters hit .182 with a .307 slugging percentage, a 38.5 percent whiff rate and a 29 percent strikeout rate against it. And the pitch had over four inches more vertical break than average.
The Dominican Republic native only used his fastball (92.8 MPH) 6.8 percent of the time last season. As his primary putaway pitch, (36.4 percent) it generated a 57.1 percent whiff rate and a 50 percent strikeout rate.
His slider (83.9 MPH), thrown 5.9 percent of the time in 2022, generated a 33.3 percent whiff rate and 28.6 percent strikeout rate. It also had over two inches more vertical break than average.
Only the slider (50 percent) had a hard-hit rate higher than 37.7 percent last season.
Rodriguez got a ton of chases (94th percentile) and only allowed three of 17 inherited runners to score.
Joely Rodriguez has a skill set the Red Sox need out of their pitchers. Desperately. Yeah, that skill set hasn’t translated to actual results yet, but for $2 million, there’s minimal risk involved.
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